Lolita sewing: Ivory and blue floral JSK

Last weekend (which was a long weekend and also my birthday) I finally finished up work on a JSK that has been a long time in the imagining and a long time in the making. I will preface this post with saying that really I'm only about 40% happy with it. Aesthetically it's nice, my construction is pretty good by my standards but the bodice doesn't fit right and I made the lining too short so the lace on the hem doesn't show as much as it should. Mostly the fit bothers me, and I think I essentially made it too small so it's all bunchy. But I'm getting back on the fitness bandwagon so we'll see if it fits better in a few months.

Anyhoo, here are a few photos of the finished product! The colours are kind of all over the place in all these photos but the two close-ups are probably the most accurate.

Firstly, in an outfit with another handmade piece of mine in an outfit I would totally wear. You can see how little the hem lace shows here.

Especially compared to how gorgeous the lace really is! This is vintage eyelet lace I've been hoarding for years and never had the perfect project to use it on.

The bodice features this pretty floral guipure lace place in a bit of an old-school way up over the bust and along the top. I contemplated putting lace on the straps as well but it seemed like overkill in the end. This lace was expensive but so worth it, especially since the dress fabric was free and the eyelet lace was $2/metre.

Lastly, a quick shot of the back. I'm pretty pleased with how neatly my shirring turned out. Like I said at the start, other than the fit (which may improve as I lose weight) I'm quite pleased with how this turned out.

I'll be posting up one of my typical "one dress, three outfits" posts with this dress quite soon ^__^

Lolita 52: Lolitas I have met in real life and lolitas I would love to meet

Combing two topics into one post here because I don't have much to say on the first one. Because I have met two nice lolitas from the Sydney Community (we met up for lunch and ice-cream one day) and before that had done a couple of photoshoots with another girl from Sydney, but that's it. I have made no lolita bosom friends, nor have I gone to any meets-ups, nor have I met anyone e-famous, or even talked to anyone e-famous aside from the occasional blog comment here and there.

On the second topic there are a few lolitas who I know of online who I would like to meet for a variety of reasons...

Sakura Fairy / Lily of the Valley

I would love to meet Sakura Fairy not just because she makes really beautiful clothes but because she seems to have a taste for the fantastical and whimsical, and I tend to get on with people like that. She also seems very down-to-earth, creative and just all-round nice.

Princess Peachie

I love how cheerful Peachie always seems! From her videos and her tumblr I just get the impression that she’d be someone really fun and easy-going to hang out with.

Rosalynn / Lolita Wonderland

Lastly, I’d love to meet Rosalynn because her blog is my favourite ever lolita blog. She’s just got a great excitement about this fashion that I find very endearing and I always enjoy rading everything she posts.

So those are the lolitas I have met and would like to meet; what about you?

Happy birthday to me!

Yesterday was my birthday (quarter century, woot!), and I just quickly had to share the wonderful, amazing an pretty damn accurate picture of us that James commissioned from and awesome artist friend of ours for me.

Yes, that is a framed print of me drinking tea and groping James who is serving me cupcakes in an arse-less butler outfit (or butt-ler outfit, as someone said on facebook and that I wish I'd thought of first). It's so me. It's so us. It's so perfect.

But in slightly less good news our poor Panda was really sick all weekend, so we had to take him to an emergency after-hours vet and then he was hospitalised overnight the next day at our regular vet. He seems to be on the mend and they didn't find anything bad in his blood, urine or on his x-rays but his blood is getting sent off for an FIV test tomorrow so it's not all over yet.

So yes, that's a little personal Roli update but don't worry, I've got plenty of lolita content queued up to go up soon  ^__^

L325 outfits, or; An example of why solid-coloured pieces are awesome.

I'll start this post by saying I derped. I messed up. I made a mistake. Recently on a free weekend I took photos for several posts so I could fill up my blog schedule and I thought, "Hey, let's do an outfit post with my green Bodyline corset skirt". So I did. And then I realised I had already done that before I started my new job but had never posted them.

Therefore, this post features six outfits rather than my usual three. In each set I did a green/ivory and at least one green/pink or peach/brown outfit but I still wanted to share everything despite the repetition because it shows how you can make outfits subtly different even when you use a lot of the same pieces or colour schemes.

Firstly, let's have the original, forgotten three outfits then I'll follow up with the newer set.

Looking back, I kind of consider this outfit a cheat. This blouse is shortly going to depart my wardrobe because it looks great in flat-lays, but not on me. Ever time I try it on I become more unhappy with it. But, on the plus side that headbow is perfect with this outfit, which is good because I bought it specifically to watch this skirt!

A warm, wintry outfit working with peach and dark brown. I have to say those Innocent World socks are one of my favourite pairs, they just work really well with so much of my wardrobe.

Following that, a more spring-appropriate outfit with similar pink and slightly lighter brown pieces. The paler (and shorter) socks and the ivory trim on the bolero make this a much more casual and lighter outfit overall, which I think is quite the accomplishment with a dark green skirt.

And now here are the second lot of outfits I made!

The first outfit of the second set really shows that I do approach pieces in similar ways... this is virtually identical to the first outfit of the first set! But ivory and dark green work well, though here I've used a nicer blouse and brown shoes. I'm a bit unsure about the shoes, but I wasn't feeling the ivory ones this time around and wanted something darker on the bottom. I think they work, but I don't usually go for non-matching shoes so it feels a bit weird to me.

This outfit also look familiar, doesn't it? To be honest, I think I did the green/brown/pink or peach better in the first lot of outfits ^__^ Ah well, can't win everytime.

Lastly, a more gothic outfit! It's still classic, really, but it's about as far along the classic to gothic spectrum as I go. I trimmed that bolero with green braid specifically to match with this skirt and I really like this look. I'd wear it with black lace tights, which aren't in the picture because they look awful when they aren't worn.

So there you have it! An unusually long outfit post. Overall I have to say that L325 is one of my favourite pieces. Due to its unusual colour it's not the most versatile thing since it's a bit hard to match, but it's a fantastic piece and definitely one of Bodyline's best.